Michael Pearl, in “No Greater Joy”, offers the following:
I well know that you have been taught incorrectly. Most preachers and Bible teachers are totally in the dark on this subject. They give you a path to becoming the “new man” that is sprinkled with words and phrases like, “die to self, surrender, have faith, trust God, pray, read your Bible, turn it over to the Lord, let Him carry your burden, etc.” They and you are thinking “Do,” when God is offering “Done.”
It is not what you can do for God, nor even what God can do in you; victory is a matter of what God has already done for you and TO you. It is not a matter of God creating reality in you but of a reality that already exists. Your part is nothing more that hearing and believing.
God offers a new definition of self and it is yours to believe.